Hey, one of my 5 red efts won’t feed, he kind of stares the fruit flies down and moves towards them a bit, but he can’t seem to catch them, and he’s starting to get really skinny. I had already quarantined him and another one of the efts from the 20 long to a plastic 5 gallon (that was all that I had to offer at the moment) the other one is starting to get good and is regularly hunting the flies down and catching them. I have tried sticking the flies to cotton balls but that doesn’t seem to work. I need help feeding him, pronto, any advice wanted asap, thanks very much for your time, comments, suggestions, and regards. Again thanks, have a nice day. :)

Hi,
I have kept red efts, some lived a long time and graduated to the aquatic phase, which I somehow felt bittersweet about because they are so much more colorful in the eft stage! Anyhow, I found them to be quite hardy in general, although occasionally susceptible to certain diseases like redleg if the substrate was not kept as fresh as possible, at all times.

I suggest that you isolate the problem specimen in a small container by itself, and offer it some slow-moving prey such as pinhead crickets with the hind legs removed, very small pillbugs or sowbugs, very small baby earthworms (or cut sections of these if necessary), etc. Sometimes they can get bored with just one type of food like fruitflies and want more variety... please try some of my suggestions and let me know what happens.

Sry that i haven’t gotten back to you in a bit, but sure i’ll try tht, I’ve already put him in a smaller container but i’ve been told to keep them in groups but i’ll see if that works. Thanks for your response :)

In my experience, keeping him isolated for a while will do no harm, just until you fatten him up a little... I also wanted to mention springtails, another small prey item, if you can get them... but make sure not to use anything harmful, such as mites.